For more than a year, directly across from Lakeview Middle School, under the shade trees near the Valley Church properties, a known drug offender had set up an encampment. Several individuals living illegally in this location, accumulated mountains of trash, pallets, crates, discarded furniture, tarps, and human waste which flowed into the irrigation channels that lead to local farms. Many neighbors sent complaints requesting removal of the site and cleanup of the refuse.
Finally, on March 1, 2022, volunteer students from St. Francis School, the Community Action Board, the County of Santa Cruz Public Works, and several local residents cleared out the debris, regraded the landscape, seeded grass and limbed up trees to prevent encampment reestablishment.
St. Francis High School students volunteer to clean up garbage from Eastlake encampment.
Neighbors and local residents fed up with the environmental destruction caused by the encampment assisted in the cleanup.
Proud of their accomplishment and valuable contribution to cleaning up the environment, St. Francis students stand before a container of accumulated trash.